Evil Will Walk Once More (1
by Xfairy
Summary: Anyone know Phantasmagoria? Mulder and Scully encounter an ancient and evil spirit...


WARNING!

This is an X-Files/Phantasmagoria crossover! Some unpleasant violence-scenes may appear!

SECOND WARNING!

This is my first fanfic ever. I'm not liable for any damage.

Title: Evil will walk once more

Author: X_fairy fairy175@yahoo.com

Disclaimer: Phantasmagoria, Adrienne Delaney and everyone else involved in the game belong to Sierra, the 

X-files belong to CC and Mulder and Scully belong to each other, not to me! No infringement intended!

Rating: R, I think, for violence (but not yet in this part) 

Category: SR??

Spoilers: Don't know yet

Archive: Anywhere, with my name and addy, but please let me know! 

Feedback: Please! Otherwise, I might not have the courage to get this story to an end.

Thanks to Jackie, who encouraged me a lot on this one. It'd never have gotten that far without her!

Dedicated to my father, who pays the phone bill when I'm reading fanfic once again, and to my mother who endures me sitting in front of the comp all day.

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Evil Will Walk Once More

by X_fairy

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Part One

Just out of Nipawomsett

October 16th 1998

9:00 AM

She had always loved old houses. 

She remembered visiting an aunt of hers when she had been about four. They had lived in a nearly ancient house, which seemed to fall apart at every edge and every corner, but nothing ever really happened. Her cousin, who was twelve at the time, had shown her a secret panel hidden in a wall... It had been fun crawling through the dusty corridors where nobody had been for half an eternity....

Adrienne Delaney broke out of her reveries when her husband put his arms around her waist from behind. She turned and hugged him back. "'Morning Don."

Donald Gordon gently kissed his wife. He was glad that they had finally found a house they both liked. They hadn't moved in more than twenty-four hours ago, and he had already decided where he wanted to install the photo lab he had always wanted. There was a spare bathroom at the first floor he thought could correspond to his ideas of a lab...

"Cup of coffee?" Adrienne asked, disentangling herself from his arms. 

He was startled. "Sure, honey."

After breakfast, Donald returned to his makeshift lab. Adrienne started to examine the house, looking for something mysterious and exciting that would make the house even more loveable to her. She just needed somewhere to start. 

She opened the door to the pantry, as it was nearest. Everything appeared perfectly normal, even the light bulb she found dangling from the ceiling was still alright, and gave a slightly dizzy light as she pulled the cord. But then she slipped on the rug that covered the floor of the tiny room, and cried in excitement. "Whoa!" 

She had discovered a wooden trap door, but her excitement faded quickly as she realized that she couldn't open it with her bare hands. 

She stood up and looked around for something to use as a lever. Since she didn't seem to find anything in the kitchen, she walked over to the dining-room. It seemed to be empty except for a long, heavy table and a large mirror at the other end of the room. She knelt down in front of the fireplace to warm her hands that still hurt from pulling at the trap door, and here she discovered what she needed: an iron firetool on a little hook next to the flames. She took it with her to the trap door, and with the help of this lever she managed to open it. 

A steep, dark stairway awaited her. She started to search the kitchen drawers for a flashlight, but only found some matches. In the dim light of one of it, she spotted an old oil lantern a few steps down. She lit it with the last match and hoped that it would be enough to light the way.

It was. 

She gasped at the sight before her in the dim light of the lantern. The wide cellar room was filled with large barrels of wine and a huge wine-press in a corner. She saw the light glitter on something on the floor and was surprised to find a hammer lying there. In another corner she saw a heavy iron door. She took a look at the room behind, and suddenly felt slightly uneasy at the sight of a pair of iron handcuffs dangling from the wall at the end of a big chain. From the corner of her eye she saw a movement, like a shadow, but when she turned there was nothing. She quickly ran up the stairs, threw the trap door shut and shook her head anxiously. Perhaps she wouldn't like the house that much....

Less light-hearted than before, Adrienne continued her exploration of the house. In the entrance hall she found a mechanic fortune-teller next to the front-door. There was still a token in the slot and she tried it, just to see what would happen. The machine produced a small piece of paper with a saying on it. She read, "Evil will walk once more." Now, what the hell did THAT mean? It seemed that this house, which she had still liked so much half an hour ago was becoming more and more weird with every step she took. 

Nonetheless, she went on. After finding all the doors in the hall locked, she walked up the stairs to the second floor. From the top of the stairs she looked down again. That picture over the fireplace was really disturbing.... Actually, there were far too many of those large portraits everywhere in the house for her liking, especially those of that strange magician the house had once belonged to.... He seemed too weird to her. 

The first room upstairs seemed to have been a woman's bedroom.... She picked up a package of cards from a table and started to open some drawers. Most of them were empty, but then she found one that contained an old letter which was already yellowed at the edges. She started to read and found it to be just as disturbing as the paintings. It was the letter of a wife to her lover, but the fear of discovering seemed to be more than just that of a woman who had cheated on her husband....

Shaking her head, Adrienne put the letter back and went on to the next room. The first thing she saw was another picture of the magician.... She shuddered. The whole room gave her a weird feeling. She sat down on the large bed and lay back. She felt herself drifting off into a dream, as she often did...... but this time it was a nightmare. A blinding white light approached her with unimaginable speed, and then a lot of large hands came out of the bed, grabbing her to pull her into it..... 

Breathing heavily, she pulled herself loose, got up and stared at the bed unbelievingly. Then she started to tremble and screamed at the top of her lungs, "Don! Doooooonnnn!!!!!" 

Half a minute later, her husband came running into the room. "Honey? What happened?" he asked, concerned.

She was still terrified. She pressed out, "The bed.... the bed grabbed me!"

He put his arms around her and tried to calm her down. "The old house makes your imagination go wild, honey."

She let her wracked nerves be calmed by his soothing words, finally pulled herself from his arms and assured him that she was fine and that he could go back to work. 

The next room was the spare bathroom that Don wanted to turn into a lab. When she came in, he was trying to unscrew the drain of the wash-basin. The tongs slipped out of his hand and he cried out, "Ow!" 

She took his hand and looked at it closely. 

He pulled it away impatiently. "I'm alright. I could use some drain cleaner, we got something like that?" 

She shook her head no, "Don't think so. Can I help you?" 

He was already back under the sink. "Sure, gimme those tongs."

"Something else?"

"If you could find me some drain cleaner..."

She tried to keep that in mind, and went on. The last room on that floor was weird on the first view. On a little table at the door stood a phonograph and next to it a strange chair that looked like some sort of torturing instrument. When she touched it, she received a light electric shock. More and more weird with every step...... 

At the opposite wall was a mirror. Only now she realized how many mirrors there were in this house.... nearly one in each room.....

She put that thought in the back of her mind to come back to it later.

Done with the second floor, she went up to the third. At the right of the stairs, there was a door slightly ajar. The only thing she saw in the room was a teddy-bear sitting on a chest-drawer. She went in and pick it up -- and its head fell down. Anxiously, she picked it up and put it back. Then she turned to look at the rest of the room -- and the next shock wasn't far: At the end of the room stood a rocking chair and a cradle. Over the cradle there seemed to be some sort of cloud in the air. She tried to touch it -- it felt very strange, slightly oily. Suddenly the chair started to rock. She jumped back and ran out of the room. More and more weird....

The next room was the real bathroom. She didn't even enter it, she knew there was nothing interesting, she had used it just this morning.

She walked down the hall. On the right was her bedroom, so she went to the left first. She entered a large hall, almost like a studio or a conservatory. But there was nothing of interest to be seen -- only some pictures which seemed to have been painted by the same woman who had written the letter she had found earlier. 

On her way back down, Adrienne saw another door, vis-à-vis to the child's room, which was also locked. She decided to go into town to have a talk to the realtor. It seemed to her that he hadn't given them all the keys....

When she came back from town, she was still upset about the realtor's behavior. How could they have bought a house from that man? He was so arrogant, so high-handed, so..... She didn't know how to describe it. Of course he had had another key, and of course he hadn't admitted that he had it. She'd had to search for it by herself. It was so annoying!

She started trying the key in the doors in the entrance hall. It didn't fit in the strange big door that looked almost like a portal. Next she tried a door a the end of a small hallway that branched off of the entrance hall. And here the key fitted! Behind, there was a small room that seemed to be a library or a conference room. In a corner, there was a little desk. When she examined it closer, she found a little statue of a cat sitting on the top. She picked it up and cried in surprise when a thin blade snapped out of it. "A letter-opener!" She let the blade slide back and put the opener in her pocket. 

Most of the desk-drawers were locked, but one was open. Inside, she saw another letter, this time it seemed to be from the magician itself. Zoltan.... what a strange name. 

On the table in the middle of the room she spotted a magazine that was open somewhere in the middle. She stepped nearer and started to read an article on what seemed to be one of the magician's shows. It sounded ugly. "...torture devices..." in a magic show? She stepped back, once again shaking her head. This one was *really* weird. 

When she turned around, the fireplace of the room attracted her attention. It was walled up....... but there seemed to be a loose brick....

She pushed lightly and the brick fell back. She took the letter-opener from her pocket and started to scratch away the plaster, curious why somebody had considered a room secret enough to hide it behind a wall.

After about an hour of scratching, pulling out bricks and some broken fingernails, she had removed enough of the wall for her to go through the hole. She stooped low and went through the former fireplace and discovered....... a chapel?!

This didn't seem to be worth hiding behind a wall! She started to look around. There was nothing unusual for a chapel -- some benches, colored windows, an altar, a little standing-desk. On the altar sat a little wooden box and on top of it a heavy book. She picked the book up and put it on the desk to have a look at it. It was the family tree of the magician. It seemed that the house had belonged to the Carnovach family for several centuries..... Zoltan had been the last one, there hadn't been anyone left to record his death. He had had several wives, but all of them had died before him.....

She closed the book and eyed the small box on the altar curiously. The clasp seemed to be broken.... she picked up a little piece of metal from the floor. When she wanted to put it back on the box, it suddenly flew open and some sort of....green cloud?.....exploded straight into her face. She quickly covered her eyes, the cloud vanished through the hole it the wall and only moments later she heard a sharp cry from upstairs. "Don!" she exclaimed and ran out into the hall and up the stairs to see what had happened to him. The green cloud was forgotten for the moment. When she reached him, he lay on the floor, obviously unconscious. But he soon regained consciousness. She helped him up and asked, "You okay, honey?"

He couldn't tell her what had happened, and decided to lay down for some time. She went downstairs to prepare dinner.

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The next morning 

10:00 AM

Adrienne was sitting in front of her laptop and was about to start writing, when she heard her husband call from downstairs. 

"Adrienne, where are you?"

"In here!" she called back.

"Where?" He sounded annoyed, although she hadn't the slightest idea why.

"In here, in the bedroom!"

A moment later he stormed in, fuming. "You didn't go buy that drain cleaner, like I asked you?"

She had to admit she hadn't thought of it, but he was making a mountain out of a mole-hill, being as furious as he was. In the end she was ready to cry. "I'll go buy your damn drain cleaner!" she yelled after him.

What was wrong with him? She couldn't think of anything she had done that could have enraged him like that. Or perhaps it had something to do with that strange green cloud....? Perhaps it was some sort of toxin....? But why didn't she feel the effects then....?

She tried to think of someone she could talk to. The only person that came to her mind was her cousin Ringo. She decided to send him an e-mail, since they didn't have a phone yet. What was his address....? Gunman @????.com? No, Gunmen, it was. She logged herself in, opened a mail form and started to write.

End of Part One


End file.
